Race, Family and the Trump Era

Never Miss A Story.

Daily Edition

Theater Reviews

Empty

Venue: Duke of York’s Theatre, London (Through July 5)

Polly Stenham wrote “That Face,” a play about the disintegration of awell-off family, when she was 19. But you wouldn’t know it until theshrieking of two siblings and their estranged parents goes from strident toadolescent.

Staged last year by the Royal Court and now transferred to the Duke ofYork’s Theatre in London’s West End under the direction of Jeremy Herrin,the play has won plaudits for the young playwright, and there’s little doubtthat Stenham will go far.

Classy stage veteran Lindsay Duncan does a great deal to give more depththan is on the page to the portrayal of Martha, a once-beautiful woman nowravaged by alcoholism. There’s no real accounting of her descent into a sortof refined squalor, her callous dismissal of teenaged daughter Mia (HannahMurray) and adoring but selfish domination of artistic son Henry (MattSmith).

The absence of rich ex-husband Hugh (Julian Wadham), who’s remarried andlives in luxury in Hong Kong, has much to do with it, but though he returnsto deal with his squabbling family, not much more is revealed.

Stenham begins the play with a scene of torture in a private school thatcauses Mia to be threatened with expulsion and then cuts to an unkemptbedroom where Martha is lolling about in the sheets with Henry. The incestis implied more than acted upon, and when Henry reveals that he has taken alover, mumsy at first assumes it must be another boy and is quite pleased.Upon discovering that his partner is female, she erupts with a nasty act ofjealousy.

The increasing frenzy and unexplored background to events conspire to weakenthe eventual confrontations, and an enigmatic ending doesn’t help. Duncan isperfectly in control as the self-indulgent and provocative mother, andWadham brings an air of befuddled impatience to the father.

The younger actors do not fare so well, with Murray not best cast as asteely and sometimes cruel young woman and Smith encouraged to demonstratefrom the outset that this mother’s boy is seriously damaged goods.